ICC Intercontinental Cup and Shield

SCOTLAND v IRELAND With home advantage, Scotland were expected to win this encounter despite Douglas Lockhart and Ian Stanger being unavailable because of injuries. Ireland were without Ed Joyce, Andrew White, Eoin Morgan (all required by their English counties) and Trent Johnston (unable to get leave from work). Rain overnight and in the morning prevented play before 3.15 pm on the first day. Colin Wright won the toss and asked Ireland to bat first on a pitch with uncertain bounce. Ireland lost two wickets for only 1 run and thereafter wickets fell at regular intervals. Scoring was slow and although Jeremy Bray, Dom Joyce, Kyle McCallan and Paul Mooney all passed twenty, none stayed long enough to provide the innings with a solid foundation. All the Scottish pace bowlers received help from the pitch and the spinners, Gregor Maiden and Ryan Watson, introduced when the light turned poor, got the ball to turn, albeit slowly. Overall Ireland batted poorly until Adrian McCoubrey, defending stoutly. and Greg Thompson, attacking the bowling, added 25 runs to take Ireland to 153 for nine at the close. On the second morning, Ireland added a further 19 runs in seven overs with the help of two dropped catches. Scotland lost Fraser Watts with only 12 on the board but Steven Knox and Neil MacRae, batting with care, remained undefeated at lunch when the score was 83 for one. All three of Ireland’s quicker bowlers contributed to the total through no-balls. Knox mis-hit McCoubrey to McCallan the second ball after the interval, whereupon Ryan Watson and MacRae added 32 runs in 11 overs, aided by Ireland’s failure to place a fielder at third man. However, from being nicely positioned at 116 for two, Scotland suddenly found themselves at 122 for five. The most careless of the dismissals was that of Colin Smith who, while awaiting the umpire’s verdict on an appeal by Andre Botha for leg-before, stood outside his crease, enabling Peter Gillespie to throw the ball at the stumps from short leg for an easy run-out. Cedric English provided the backbone to the remainder of the innings, first by adding 70 with Wright for the sixth wicket and then in smaller partnerships with Maiden and Paul Hoffmann. He hit ten fours in his 66 runs, made at a strike rate of 51.5. After English and Hoffmann lost their wickets at the same score, Sean Weeraratna and Dewald Nel were allowed the luxury of a partnership of no runs from four balls before Wright decided to declare, leaving Ireland 18 overs to face, starting at 6.00 pm. By the close, Scotland had obtained two Irish wickets and had a lead of 16 runs. The third day started with Gregor Maiden keeping wicket for Scotland, Smith, a policeman, having been summoned to the Aberdeen Sheriff’s Court as a witness. He missed only 10 overs, however, since the accused overslept and the case had to be abandoned. Meanwhile, Botha and Dom Joyce produced the most convincing Irish batting of the match, a partnership of 50 runs. Rain stopped play for 135 minutes with the score at 106 for three, during which time lunch was taken. In the afternoon, the off spinners, Maiden and Ryan Watson, found some assistance from the pitch and took six wickets for 88 runs in 30 overs. No Irish batsman was comfortable and the innings ended at 4.10 pm, leaving Scotland a target of 135 runs in 39 overs. Knox and Watts faced one over before tea, taken at 5 without loss. When play resumed what should have been a relatively straightforward task suddenly became a major challenge as McCoubrey took four wickets for 15 runs in seven overs, Watts and Watson falling to ill-judged hook shots. From 69 for four, Scotland lost wickets regularly. Knox and Hoffmann fell in consecutive balls and Maiden narrowly survived the hat-trick ball, mis-hitting it for two runs to third man. After the seventh wicket fell at 78, Wright entered the fray, despite a broken finger. Nine runs came from the 32nd over of the innings, bowled by McCallan. In the 34th over, Wright steered McCallan to square leg for two runs which became six after a shy at the stumps at the bowler’s end led to four overthrows. McCallan bowled Maiden with the score on 102, leaving Scotland to make 33 off 32 balls. After 16 of these were made without incident, Weeraratna, the non-striker, went for a run for a ball wide of the wicketkeeper; Wright, the batsman, sent him back but he was too slow for Greg Wilson’s throw to Botha. McCallan was entrusted with the penultimate over. After two balls without scoring, Nel drove square for three runs; Wright then hit the next two balls over long on for six. With only four runs to get, Wright needed a single from the last ball to keep the strike. As he drove the ball straight back to the bowler, Nel foolishly set off and was easily run out by the bowler. The Irish team were thrilled to have beaten Scotland on their home ground but, in reality, Scotland lost a match they should have won. After taking four wickets in Ireland’s first innings and batting heroically in Scotland’s second innings, the captain, Wright, must have wondered about the lack of application shown by some of his colleagues. 64 ICC Intercontinental Cup 2005